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My attempts to replace the factory radio in my beloved Subaru Forester have failed, miserably. The beautiful new stereo I purchased lies dead on my dash, no matter how hard I hope when I turn the ignition.
Despite the NPR withdrawal I’m going through, I think I’m okay with the situation, because in the process of destroying my car, I’ve learned a few things:
More than this, I’ve gained enough of an understanding for how my car works, that my Forester is no longer an intimidating black box. When I was 16 and inherited my first car, I vividly remember my dad’s instructions: “Take it to the dealership when you’re supposed to. Don’t try to fix it yourself; you’ll just end up breaking it.”
As it turns out, my dad was right, I “shot my eye out”, if you will. But this weekend I’m going to break out the soldering iron again and get my stereo working. And the next time my Forester breaks and I fix it myself, I think I’ll give him a call. Maybe he needs someone to fix his car.
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After holding out for an Internet-eternity, Rob and Tyler have convinced me to give Spotify a try.
I’d used a free account occasionally over the past few weeks, but I signed up for Spotify Premium ($10/mo) last night and decided to go 100% Spotify (no iTunes/Pandora) for at least the first month of my subscription.
I made a “stuff to listen to” playlist of all of the bands people have recommended in the past few weeks (and I never got around to listening to) and it was super fast and easy. The catalog had everything I needed, and playlist creation was a snap. The friction that keeps me from trying new music is gone entirely.
Being able to send songs to people / having an inbox of songs from others. If network effects get going this (and collaborative playlists) could be what make me stay on Spotify despite the complaints below.
Link reblogged from Give Me Something To Read
American public education is a failed enterprise. The problem is not money. Public schools already spend too much. Test scores are low because there are so many bad teachers, whose jobs are protected by powerful unions. Students drop out because the schools fail them, but they could accomplish practically anything if they were saved from bad teachers. They would get higher test scores if schools could fire more bad teachers and pay more to good ones. The only hope for the future of our society, especially for poor black and Hispanic children, is escape from public schools, especially to charter schools, which are mostly funded by the government but controlled by private organizations, many of them operating to make a profit.
A few points
Ravich points out a number of issues with charters as they currently exist. The system is in need of reform - and I’d love to see the elimination of for-profit charters, greater financial accountability (i.e. no more million dollar principals), elimination of “cherry picking” (i.e. not enrolling or exiting students with disabilities), and increased accountability to school boards for failing/substandard charters.
But Ravich also helps perpetuate a number of myths about charters by insisting on calling them “privately managed,” when the vast majority are run with public dollars, by non-profits, and are accountable to school boards.
I think Ravich throws up a straw man when it comes to poverty. Absolutely no one is denying that poverty matters. Absolutely no one is arguing against fighting poverty. The reformer argument as I see it is that we can’t wait for poor students to overcome poverty before we educate them. The power of the charter schools shown in Superman (or the school I teach at!) is that they are all places where poor students have succeeded despite the challenges they face at home. They give us hope that we might be able to get the chicken before the egg.
Ravich seems really mixed about whether we ought to listen to parents or not. She cites the high percentage of parents giving their public school an “A” or a “B” as means of supporting the existing public schools system, yet she doesn’t seem to see the outrageous number of parents entering lotteries as justification to scale up the successful charter models (i.e. KIPP/Harlem Success Academy/etc) of the world.
There is a clash of ideas occurring in education right now between those who believe that public education is not only a fundamental right but a vital public service, akin to the public provision of police, fire protection, parks, and public libraries, and those who believe that the private sector is always superior to the public sector. Waiting for “Superman” is a powerful weapon on behalf of those championing the “free market” and privatization. It raises important questions, but all of the answers it offers require a transfer of public funds to the private sector. The stock market crash of 2008 should suffice to remind us that the managers of the private sector do not have a monopoly on success.
Here, Ravich becomes absurd. Charter schools in no way call into question every students right to a public education. If Ravich is so upset about the for-profit charters (and she has every right to be!) she should focus her attention on changing the laws that allow them to exist, rather than broadly painting all charter schools as part of the private sector.
Source: givemesomethingtoread
Third in a series of non-comprehensive, incredibly subjective trip reports masquerading as “travel guides.”
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When I headed off to college, I stopped listening to new music. Whatever the gene that makes old people listen to oldies - it had turned on, and I’d resigned myself to spending the rest of my life listening to Radiohead and The Postal Service. That changed this year. My iTunes library doubled in size (it just broke 10,000 songs). I co-wrote a (short-lived) music blog (more on that at the end of this post). And now, I’m even (belatedly) throwing my hat into the end of year list crowd.
I made a playlist on lala to accompany this list with a song from every band I mention. If you read at about 3 words per minute, the playlist will sync to the post, a la Dark Side of the Rainbow. You might see it embedded below, or if you’re reading this on the dashboard - just go here. (more on lala, below).
Animal Collective - Merriweather Post Pavillion
Abstract and accessible. Overhyped + all that, but still a fucking amazing album.
The Very Best - Warm Heart of Africa
I’m really, really hooked on the indie meets Africa sound. Check out their fantastic mixtape if you haven’t already.
The Low Anthem - Oh My God Charlie Darwin
The most beautiful album I heard all year (and a “Human Evolutionary Biology” reference, to boot!)
Coeur de Pirate - Ensemble
I first heard this song in this youtube video, and quickly became obsessed with the tattoed, dyed-blond, French-Canadian who sings it.
Edward Sharpe & The Magnetic Zeros - Home
“Girl, I’ve never loved one like you”
Girls - Lust for Life
Better than Drake’s creepy, spoken word “Lust for Life”? Of course. Better than Iggy Pop’s track that opens Trainspotting? Debatable.
Folk
The Low Anthem, Swell Season & Edward Sharpe have dominated my car’s CD player this year.
Lo-fi
Wavves, Girls, Neon Indian: all great, all made me want to listen to Daydream Nation on repeat.
Mixtape Rap
Is this a genre? That might be a stretch, but I listened to mixtapes by Drake/Kid Cudi/Wale/Lil Wayne far more than any hip hop album this year (favorite non-mixtape hip hop: Raekwon - Only Built 4 Cuban Linx Pt III).
Monolith Festival - Day 1
The day was all-around ridiculous (meeting Caitlin Rose, observing the spectacle that is Of Montreal, M. Ward, Pains of Being Pure at Heart…).The night ended with all of us on stage for Girl Talk just going crazy. Highlights were a girl asking me if she could have some of the pills I was on (sorry, girl, but pure rock&roll joy don’t come from a pill), and some jailbait hitting on Gillis mercilessly while he did his whole laptop thing.
Ratatat @ Yardfest
Fun? At Yardfest? Unbelievable!
Ladytron, The Faint, Telepathe
I was not wearing enough eye makeup to be in attendance.
lala.com
It’s iTunes in the cloud (and since lala was just bought by Apple, it could very well be the cloud version of iTunes soon!). There’s an uploader to make your iTunes library portable, and you get a free stream of any song they have. Unlimited streams are cheap (10 cents, and you get a bunch for free), and mp3s are comparable in price to the iTunes Music Store + Amazon.
Pitchfork
Half of the music they love is unlistenably avant-garde (i.e. Dirty Projectors). The other half is my list above. For what it’s worth, they also love lala.
Hype Machine
On the one hand, it’s all buzz band remixes, “classic” indie tracks (i.e. Postal Service), and pop rap. On the other hand, I love that shit.
Conor Oberst - Outer South
Made me miss Bright Eyes.
The Boy Least Likely To - The Law of the Playground
Not as innocent & twee the second time around.
Vampire Weekend - Cousins
Okay, so it isn’t out yet. And it hasn’t leaked (surprising!). And “Horchata” is pretty good. But I didn’t really have a third “sophomore slump” and I assume no one has actually read this far.
Flosstradamus - Overnight Star
This post topped Carl Sagan’s list as well.
Savage Garden - I Want You (acoustic)
Nostalgia. A hro reference. And a pretty nifty version of a classic song.
Jets to Brazil - Orange Rhyming Dictionary
Comments from people after I posted this made me realize I’m not the only person in the world who likes Jets to Brazil. Plus, a Widener library reference.
Jaicko - Oh Yeah
I just heard this song on the radio tonight and it blew me away.
On the one hand, the song is mindless ear candy which is more than “a little annoying.” Jaicko takes an incredibly simple hook (“Oh yeah”) and abuses the hell out of it until it’s certain to get stuck in your head.
On the other hand, between the “Oh yeahs” Jaicko shows a sharp sense of self-awareness:
You don’t even know why you’re turning up your radio
Bobbin’ your head in your car, cause you feel me though
Don’t be mad cause i got you singing oh yeah, oh yeah
So does a dash of meta save an otherwise unreedemable song? Jaicko has an answer, “But now I’m making’ dollars, so i really don’t care.”
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Along the lines of my montreal post, a non-expert’s opinion on things you should do if you’re visiting Rome.
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Google just offered me $100 of free advertising. It’s clearly an incredible opportunity for me to expand the reach of 2arrs2ells… but what search terms should I bid on?
Some of the search terms that have already sent me traffic include:
All suggestions appreciated and almost certainly acted upon.
º Now a reality.
ª A rather embarrassing misspelling, considering the word is spelled correctly on the sign in the picture.
Monolith is a music festival outside of Denver from September 12-13. I’ve been hunting down music by all the bands performing since I bought my two day pass a month or so ago (thanks to Ralph for the heads up on the presale!).
I just made two Monolith mixes (because my car has no iPod connector), and I thought I’d share. If this incredible collection of musical goodness inspires you, tickets are still available and you’re welcome to crash at my new place in Denver*.
Monolith Day 1 (zip)
Yeah Yeah Yeahs - Heads Will Roll
Girl Talk - Friday Night
Of Montreal - Women’s Studies Victims
M. Ward - Big Boat V.3
MF Doom - Benzie Box (ft. Cee-Lo)
The Walkmen - Dónde Está la Playa
OK Go - There’s A Fire
The Pains of Being Pure at Heart - Come Saturday
Frightened Rabbit - Good Arms Vs. Bad Arms
Starfucker - German Love
Cotton Jones - Blood Red Sentimental Blues
Caitlin Rose - Shotgun Wedding
Monolith Day 2 (zip)
The Mars Volta - Cotopaxi
Chromeo - Needy Girl
Deer Tick - Art Isn’t Real (City of Sin) [Courtesy of Partisan Records]
French Horn Rebellion - Up All Night
Ida Maria - I Like You So Much Better When You’re Naked
Matty G - West Coast Rocks (The Glitch Mob Remix)
Method Man And Redman - Hey Zulu
MSTRKRFT - Heartbreaker (feat. John Legend)
Neon Indian - Deadbeat Summer
Passion Pit - I’ve Got Your Number
Phoenix - Girlfriend
Rachel Goodrich - Dope Song
The Thermals - Now We Can See
Wale - Chillin (Catch vs 9th) f. Lady Gaga
We Were Promised Jetpacks - Ships With Holes Will Sink (Courtesy of Fat Cat Records)
*Uh, assuming you’re not some random person who stumbled across this post.
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